Shipbuilder who built Mike Lynch's superyacht seeks £186m from his widow and crew over reputational damage

A lawyer for the shipbuilder of Mike Lynch's superyacht Bayesian, which sank last month, killing him and six others including his 18-year-old daughter Hannah, has filed a lawsuit seeking £186m (about 23 billion rubles) from his widow and crew.

The lawsuit, filed in a Sicilian court, was reported by the British tabloid Daily Mail. It claims that the yacht's sinking has caused enormous reputational damage and loss of revenue to the manufacturer, Italian Sea Group (IGS).

The lawsuit reportedly names as defendants the ship's captain, James Cutfield, two other crew members, Camper & Nicholsons, the company that hired the crew, and Revtom, the Isle of Man company that owned the Bayesian, which is controlled by Lynch's widow, Porticello survivor Angela Bacares.

A source close to the family said: "The Italian maritime group should be ashamed. It is a disgrace for IGS CEO Giovanni Costantino, who is desperately trying to shift the blame to others. He went to the press before all the bodies had been found, showing a lack of integrity. Now it looks like he wants to sue his own clients."

The lawsuit comes less than a month after Italian prosecutors launched a criminal investigation into the crash. The investigation is still in its early stages. The men under investigation are the crew's captain, James Cutfield, 51, chief engineer Tim Parker, 56, and another crew member, Matthew Griffiths, 22. The captain says he followed instructions and made sure everything was sealed when the yacht was hit. All those killed on the yacht are believed to have been trapped below deck.

Last month, seven people died when the £30m (£55m) superyacht Bayesian, owned by the Darktrace founder, sank off Porticello, Sicily. Among the dead were billionaire Mike Lynch, 59, and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah, as well as Morgan Stanley International chairman Jonathan Bloomer and his wife Judith, lawyer Chris Morvillo and his companion Neda, and chef Recaldo Thomas. The billionaire's death and the sinking of the yacht, which was considered unsinkable, sparked conspiracy theories because it was the yacht on which Mike Lynch was celebrating the end of a long-running fraud trial, in which he was accused of fraud. He was accompanied on the yacht by people connected to the case, following the death of his partner Stephen Chamberlain in a car crash shortly before.